Counting of tigers nearing completion

New Delhi, Aug 25 (UNI) How many tigers have been left in the country? The world's most massive exercise invloving 88000 personnel is going on to answer the eagerly and anxiously awaited question by November-December next year.

Project Tiger, the ambitious wildlife conservation venture of the government, has almost completed the data collection for its phase one and two and its report will come out by December this year.

While the work of collecting data for phase three is going on and the final report will be complete by November next year.

Presenting a report on the status of the 'Project Tiger', Secretary for the Ministry of Forest and Environment Pradeepto Ghosh told a press conference here that the Wild Life department was using the most modern methods to come to its conlusion.

''Whatever numbers, whether more or less, we arrive at after the exercise is complete, it will be authentic and final,'' Mr Ghosh told reporters.

He said the Phase one report will be about the distribution of tiger and the state of its habitat, while the phase two will be about the population of the big cat.

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